Liquidators for international SaleHoo members

My name is Tim with a company called Titan Liquidation, and you may have recently seen a few guides we have written about the liquidation industry. It has been made apparent to us over the last few weeks by member inquires that SaleHoo has many international members who are looking for great authentic designer products. Many members are hesitant to order liquidation products due to the more expensive shipping required to send products overseas, but I am writing this today to explain that international members will not only be receiving a great deal, but possibly an even better value than domestic customers within the U.S!

Within the last 2 months our international buyers have made up 40% of our business! This is something we did not predict, but when listening to customer feedback it makes perfect sense why. I will explain below why this is the case, and it is due to 2 main reasons.

The first reason is the value of U.S goods overseas (Canada, Mexico, Europe, Middle East, Australia, Asia). A designer product may sell for 50-60% of retail here in the U.S through Ebay, or possibly more in a brick and mortar store. Now take these same products and present them to overseas buyers. This same product may sell for 70-80% of retail. Buyers are just as interested in U.S designer products as U.S citizens are, but the supply is only a fraction of what is available to U.S customers. The same thing happens in the U.S where we import cars such as Audi, Ferarri, and other European brands that sell for a premium here because they are not as readily available as in the host country where they are made.

The second reason is the value of the U.S dollar. Recently the economy within the U.S has been through hard times, and as a result the dollar has weakened in comparison to the currency of other countries. Now this is a bad thing for us U.S citizens who import products or have currency related investments. This is however, a great thing for anyone importing U.S products and converting their currency to pay in USD. One buyer in Australia who purchased products from the U.S four years ago said he is getting products for 30% less now through us than they costed four years ago after the conversion from the Australian dollar is made to pay in U.S dollars. For an example please see the change in currencies below.

2006 AUD worth .72 per $1.00 USD

Currently AUD worth $1.02 per $1.00 USD

2006 CAD worth .82 per $1.00 USD

Currently CAD worth $.98 per $1.00 USD

These are just a few examples, but when looking further, the USD has remained on par or weakened over the last 5 years against most currencies. Some are significant like Australia who are receiving U.S products nearly 30% cheaper than only 4 years ago!!

To finish this post off, I would also like to let SaleHoo members know that we have been told by our customers that we are one of the very few Liquidation companies in the U.S that will ship internationally. We are very efficient at shipping internationally and have a member on staff who is an expert in international logistics. To this day have never had an issue with customs or duties within Europe, Asia, Canada, Mexico and Australia. In fact, we usually have our products pass through customs 2-3 days AHEAD of schedule with no duties. I hope this guide has shown you that liquidation buying can be extremely profitable even for overseas members!

If you are interested in discussing further options, please email us at Link hidden: Login to view or visit us at Link hidden: Login to viewAlso please remember to stop by our website and sign up for our mailing list in the top right corner. Doing so will enter you in for a drawing for a free iPod Touch. International members are welcome to enter!

Which shipping companies do you use? There are obviously some great liquidation bargains to be had from the USA right now that the Australian dollar is at parity with or above the USD.

I've had a look at your liquidations and would be extremely interested in importing some items. However, I've found when looking at other USA sites that the shipping costs from the USA usually about double the cost of the items I'd like to import. Considering I'd need to redouble the per unit cost in order to make a decent profit, it becomes quite problematic if not unfeasible to import from the USA.

What suggestions if any can you offer about reducing shipping costs to Australia.? Cheers

You are very right about shipping costs to Australia. They are among some of the highest when importing from the U.S due to the distance. In spite of this, a few of our best customers are from Australia, and have been having great success with importing our products.

The service we usually use for international shipping is UPS due to the low price compared to other international shipping services as well as the realiability. For smaller orders that are within USPS's requirements we also use them as well due to their service being pretty inexpensive.

As for ideas on how to decrease the impact shipping has on the price per piece, or margin. It is sometimes best to include either high retail value items, or light weight items mixed in with other categories you are interested in.

For example:

For example, an Australian buyer recently purchased 300 pieces from 4 different categories from us. They ordered:

and 50 pieces of Designer underwear at $4 per piece (avged $28 and up per piece. (CK, RL, Emporiop Armani, Hugo Boss..etc)

The total came to 300 pieces for $2,400 and about $800 to ship all of it(arrived in 5 days to AU). So as you can see this added about $2.67 per piece to all items. Although this is a lot more costly than domestic shipping, our customers have said the few dollars added per piece is more than made up for by the value of the AUD and the popularity/ high selling price U.S designer items fetch in Australia. So all in all the total with shipping came out to $3,200 for about 14-15k retail in U.S designer products. I hope this helps, and from what I have heard from international buyers, and the repeat business we have been getting there is definitely great profit potential in importing our goods from the U.S

Please contact us if you would like to discuss further. We would be more than happy to discuss all of our product offerings as well as give any shipping estimates you need.

We have had a great influx of Australian clients over the last few months, and we have come up with a few great strategies to help bring out the maximum value or quantity we can per lot so that the shipping stings less per piece. If anyone is interested, please contact us and we will be more than happy to discuss all of your options.